Sorry t hear this, Suggi. If you have voles, you should confirm that they are to blame by looking for the "runways" that these pests create when they dig close to the top of the soil. They do not like being in open and stay digging pretty close to the roof of the soil line. Thus, I would look to see if you can detect vole activity very close to the soft bark of hydrangea, where the stems meet the soil line. If you do not detect these runways, the mystery deepens. If you detect the runways near the base of the hydrangea, they probably have gnawed on this hydrangea's bark and-or roots and whether it recovers will depend on whether the shrub can recover on its own and whether the voles stay away and cause no more damage. You can always carefully remove the roof of these runways that they build, insert a mouse trap with peanut butter and cover the trap with an upside down box. I would make upside down "U" shaped cuts on the ends of the boxes so they do not topple these roofs & cover any places where light can get into the runways. You can also try wrapping hardware cloth around the base of the shrub (to build a fence) and/or separate the mulch from the plant base (say 4" or so) so they will have to be exposed if they want to gnaw on the stems... something they just do not like. If you put a mouse trap and catch one, put it back again to check for more. Some people will add a piece of fruit (apple, say) before adding back the mouse trap... to see if the fruit is gnawed, an indication that there may be more pests. Damage by voles usually results in localized wilting of leaves. Only the leaves that got water from gnawed roots are affected. The other unaffected parts of the bush will stay fine. The damage is not going to get better if the plant cannot recover on its own, something that will take a long time so, you may have a browned out section and an "ok" section of this hydrangea tree. I have not heard of this happening with a hydrangea tree before so I am not sure if you should wait it out or cover your loses. In the cases I have heard of, the persons took action against the voles and replaced the affected shrubs. Voles can injure hydrangeas, hostas and even roses. Luis

Pick a strong vertical stem/leader and cut everything else. Periodically clean all side shoots from that leader up to 3-4' height and let rest grow. Not all 'shrub' PG are suitable to be grown into 'tree' PG. You have to pick one that already have a defined leader. Since tree PG command higher prices than shrubs most 'strong leader' shrubs have been already selected out from the stock by growers and in commerce you'll see shrubs that are good to be grown as a shrubs, not a single trunk trees.

Some have done ok but the majority have done poorly. They were mulched extra well but they required quite a lot of water because of continuous temps above 105-110 and those drying winds. They all survived... although the worst ones droppped almost all leaves and then recovered when the fall temps arrived. It makes it obvious how important is for them to get & maintain moisture, get early shade starting around 11am-ish and get water even after they have lost all leaves. At one time, I thought I may have lost one because it lost all leaves kind of early, by mid-summer. But I kept watering it as usual just in case and it came back. They all started a second leaf out season in late September... which reminds me of some of the Braford Pear Trees in the area!!! They were leafing out too and were full of those white flowers that normally precede leaf out in the Spring. The flowers are now gone but I hope a freeze does not come by and kills them. I am glad to report that although the La Nina was forecasted to continue for one more year -it is the reason for the drought- the rains have returned in my area (around DFW Airport). I hope it is not temporary though. We have been having "regular" rains once a week since around the end of September or the start of October. Lake levels are down considerably so we are not out of the woods. We continue being on a Stage 1 drought with the possibility of once-a-week-only watering by next summer so I am not buying any shrubbery. Most of the hydrangeas still have mostly green leaves; macs are still "awake" with signs of wanting to start dormancy soon. Annabelle went dormant ahead of the pack. Mid Nov to early December is when they start going dormant and leaves dry out over here. All blooms have obviously browned out. I have noticed an increase in yellow leaves in macs and oakleafs. The plant nurseries in the area should make a killing in Spring however, since many trees and shrubs in the area look sad or dead. I expect many people will just to have to replace them. On a car trip to South Carolina last week, most of the trip within Texas showed plenty of dead trees on either side of the freeway. Some evidence of fires too. Only when we got close to the border with Louisiana did things improve some. But the area near Tyler, Longview and Marshall -where it usually rains a lot- looked stressed out. I would hope that all the state has had as much rain as we have had here but that is not the case yet so I wish us all more rain and no La Nina: http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/ Luis

It is too early. :o( They develop invisible flower buds from July (in the south) thru August/Sept (in the north) so they are now working on that. The last 2-3 years have been unusually bad, with very cold temps (colder than normal for a person's usda zone) or with temps that fluctuate from cold to warm and back to cold. That last one can make the shrubs break dormancy and leave the flower buds "unprotected"... Then a cold spell after the warm temps can zap the unprotected flower buds resulting in few or no blooms. It may be useful to winter protect the shrubs, particularly the ends of the stems which is where the flower buds develop.